


Legacy (The You Can't Hide Forever (But You Can Certainly Try) Remix)

by StarlightInHerEyes22



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, Arthur is a Prat, Child POV, Dad! Merlin, Father-Daughter Relationships, Gen, Hence the trauma, Hurt/Comfort, Lancelot is a good uncle, Major Canonical Character Death (which does not occur in the manner it did in canon), Merlin and Freya's child has magic, Merlin is a good dad, Re-mix, Traumatic things happen to a young child, in camelot, poor freya, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-21
Updated: 2016-10-21
Packaged: 2018-08-19 19:38:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8222501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlightInHerEyes22/pseuds/StarlightInHerEyes22
Summary: Since the death of her mother, Hana's whole world has consisted of the rooms at the top of the stairs;  and of her Daddy, his stories, and his magic. When the monsters come looking, Hana hides. But you can't hide forever (though you can certainly try).POV remix borrowing the plot, dialogue, and OC (with permission).





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Drag0nst0rm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drag0nst0rm/gifts).
  * Inspired by [You Can't Hide Forever (But You Can Certainly Try)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7945825) by [Drag0nst0rm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drag0nst0rm/pseuds/Drag0nst0rm). 



> Merlin is a father, Arthur is confused (what else is new) and italics are used gratuitously.
> 
> Please note that this fic is from a young kid's POV, and involves a child dealing with some pretty heavy stuff. In this universe, Freya wasn't killed by Arthur, and she and Merlin were happily (and secretly) married for several years before her untimely death. Takes place when Arthur is king.

Hana was hiding in the Cupboard.

She liked it in the Cupboard. Cupboard was dark, and quiet. Everything was close; nothing could come up behind her, or catch her unawares. It was her own little world, where nothing could see her. She was safe. 

That was the first rule. _Don’t let anyone see you. Never let anyone see you._

The Door opened, with the familiar _creak-creak-squeal_ that had only ever meant two things. Sometimes – most of the time – it meant that Daddy was home. It meant happiness and hugs and stories about the Prat and the Knights and Outside. Sometimes Daddy brought her pretty stones or flowers, or made butterflies out of air and set them dancing around her. 

But, occasionally, it meant Quiet. Quiet was like a game; and it was one that she was very good at. Daddy always told her she was very good at it. When people who weren’t Daddy or Gaius or Lancelot came into Their Room, Hana had to be Quiet, like the stuffed mouse that Daddy had made for her birthday. She closed her eyes and scrunched herself into a ball – because she _knew_ with that childish philosophy that if she made herself small, and that if she couldn’t see the person entering Their Room with heavy booted feet (nothing like Daddy’s quiet steps) then _they_ couldn’t see _her_. 

She counted her breaths, quick and shallow. Then she counted the footsteps. Usually, when she was being Quiet, it took no more than ten steps for the Door to creak shut again. Sometimes she would hear a crash, and when she came out something of Daddy’s would be broken. It always made her upset, but he never seemed to mind, simply sweeping up the pieces and holding them out in his hands to show her as they flowed back together into one whole. 

That was Rule Two. _Magic is good. Magic heals. We are not monsters._

Hana may have only been three, but she knew what being a monster meant. It was what the men in red cloaks shouted when they came carrying their bright slivers of silver. 

Four steps. Five. A smaller one, as though the person was turning around. The seventh step was closer. Hana wriggled, as Quietly as she could. The footsteps stopped, and she froze, holding her breath and trying to make Quiet the hammering of her heart. 

_They were right outside the Cupboard._

That had never happened before. That was not the way the game was meant to be played. She heard a huff, and saw a shadow move through the crack between the Cupboard’s doors, huge and looming. Bigger and broader than Daddy or Gaius, covered in bits of silver that gleamed and glimmered. She felt rather than heard the shadow raise one arm and grasp the Cupboard’s handle. 

No. No. The shadow had to stop, _now_. He was playing _wrong_.

Hana stared at the inside of the doors, suddenly petrified. Daddy would make him stop. Daddy was somewhere close, she could feel him. _Daddy make him stop-!_

The twin doors were flung open and weak sunlight flooded into her safe, dark space. Hana bit down on a squeal and huddled back into the corner of the Cupboard where the darkness still lingered as the Man-that-had-been-the-shadow gave her hiding place a cursory glance, as though not really expecting to find anything there. His gaze came to rest upon her own. 

Hana stared up at him, wide-eyed. He stared back down at her, his jaw gone slack. The Man looked nothing at all like her Daddy, her three-year-old brain noted frantically. He was the golden sun where Daddy was all pale moonlit night; large, broad and powerful where Daddy was small and slim and quick; nor did his eyes didn’t dance like Daddy’s did. His body was covered in metal, hard and unwelcoming, under-laid by crimson red. Just like-

Hana didn’t move. She didn’t know what she was supposed to do next. Daddy had never told her what should happen if someone broke the rules of Quiet. The Man blinked, and something curious twisted his expression – something confused, and hurting, and dangerous. Hana didn’t like it at all. She made her eyes go wider, trying to tell him, _no, no, don’t tell them. Don’t tell Daddy that I got it wrong._

“Merlin,” the Man called, and Hana flinched at the loudness of it. That was what Gaius called her Daddy. “Why is there a girl hiding in your wardrobe?”

Her heart skipped a beat, and her breathing steadied out. Daddy. Daddy was here. If he was here, it would be okay. She bit her lip, hoping that he wouldn’t be mad at her for breaking the first rule. It hadn’t been her fault. The Man was the one who hadn’t followed his part, after all.

“She has your eyes, Merlin. Why is there a three-year-old girl with your eyes hiding in your wardrobe?” He said it like it was an accusation. Hana nearly told him that she was almost four, and that she liked having her Daddy’s eyes. She had Mummy’s hair, she knew, but Daddy’s eyes – big and blue and shining. 

She heard feet pattering up the stairs, and recognised her Daddy’s stride. Hana nearly wept with relief when he burst through the Door and into Their Room, squeezing himself in between her and the Man and hiding her from sight. She peeked out around him, and wondered in a moment of quiet satisfaction if the Man looked so very, very angry because he knew that there was no way that he could get past _her_ Daddy. 

But then her father quickly glanced back down at her, and she scrunched herself tighter because he looked as afraid as she felt. But that was utterly incomprehensible. Daddy was strong. Daddy was brave. Daddy was infallible. And he looked frantic. 

Hana had never seen Daddy scared before. It was wrong, _wrong_ , more wrong even than the Man not following the rules. She didn’t like it. It made her notice that the Man was so much bigger than Daddy, and that he had a sword and a second skin of metal to protect him, and that he was looking at her Daddy and looking _mad_.

“Merlin?” the Man said again, cautiously, and out past him she saw another man duck through the door. He stared at her with eyes as dark as her Mummy’s; eyes that swam with shock and a thousand other emotions that she didn’t understand. Just like Mummy’s had.

“Get Lancelot,” she heard the Other Person mutter, running a hand through his hair and directing the words back out into Gaius’ Chambers. Vaguely, she heard Gaius’ creaky gait and the slam of a door as he escaped into Outside. 

“Arthur… look, she’s plainly not evidence of sorcery,” Daddy said in the silence that followed, desperation tinging his words with hysteria. “She’s probably just one of the servant’s kids.”

“I’m sure she is, seeing as you’re one of the servants,” the Man retorted harshly, and Hana frowned. She didn’t understand. Didn’t Daddy want the Man to know that she was his family? That wasn’t what Rule Three said. Rule Three said that _we never abandon family. Family is everything._

Hana whimpered. Was Daddy upset with her? Was that why he didn’t want to be family anymore?

Her father reached back and ran a comforting hand through her hair, tugging gently on the ends of it like he always did. Maybe he wasn’t angry, then. She hoped that he wasn’t angry. “Arthur, you’re scaring her. Can’t we do this somewhere else?”

“Why? So you can distract me with something? Good grief, Merlin, why didn’t you tell me?”

_“Because it’s none of your business!”_

Hana flinched, even if she didn’t entirely understand the words that they were shouting, and her Daddy’s hand started running through her hair compulsively behind his back, as though to say that he was sorry. She’d never heard him raise his voice before. Ever. Why couldn’t the Man have just followed the rules and left them alone? Why did he have to make Daddy sound so terribly unhappy and afraid?

“When was I supposed to tell you? Good servants don’t talk about their personal lives, Arthur! So when should I have told you? When I found out that Morgana was a traitor but couldn’t tell you because Uther would have had me beheaded? When I was being accused of sorcery every other week and by law you were supposed to drag in my entire family?” A pause. “When you had the weight of the world on your shoulders and you were yelling at me for disappearing?”

“It might have been a good excuse!”

“Absolutely! All I had to do was say, ‘Hey, Arthur, my wife just died, can I have some time off?’ You’d have yelled at me for not telling you sooner, and I really didn’t need that right then!” 

_“Why didn’t you tell me in the first place?”_

The sound of their argument grew steadily louder, filling the space around her as though it were a physical entity, throbbing and pounding in the back of her head. Hana grabbed at her own hair and fisted her hands against her ears, a sob welling up in the back of her throat as she tried to block them out, to will herself back to a world that Quiet and safe. _Too much, it was too much noise, too close_ – “I be better, I be better, I promise, Daddy, I promise. I be good.”

His next words, at least, were one’s that she understood, familiar even, spoken clearly in his quiet and calming voice. “Shh, it’s not your fault. You’re not in trouble. They’re not going to take you sweetheart, I promise. They’re not going to hurt you.”

She believed him. Of course she believed him. _She did, she did, she did –_

“Hang on.” Hana flinched at the unfamiliar voice, at the intrusion of someone that she could hear but not see, curled up tight with her head buried as it was in her hands. She clung to the calm and the anchor that was her Daddy as this third voice, the Other Person, cut through the anger and the shouting. “I’ve never seen her before. Not ever. She can’t have been hiding in your room this whole time.” The silence that followed was deafening. “She’s been hiding in your room the whole time? She’s been here _her entire life_?”

“She goes into Gaius’ rooms too,” Daddy whispered. “When it’s late.”

“Why?” the Man – Arthur – demanded desperately. “What happened to your wife, Merlin?”

Daddy’s wife. They were talking about her Mummy. Mother. Silver, gleaming. Flashing. Through the air. The golden dragon, etched in lifeless thread. Hiding, darkness, hidden deep. Red, glistening, everywhere, on her hands and her dress and in her hair, Mother’s eyes staring, warm, sightless – 

“Don’t ask me that, Arthur, please don’t ask me that.” The words had barely left Daddy’s mouth before The Door was suddenly slamming against the opposing wall, and Hana started as someone burst through it, staring around wildly in red cloth and chainmail, like-

-knights-

-shouting-

_\- “Run Hana, run!” -_

-screaming-

_\- “Find your father!” -_

-red-

-no-

_“I love you, little hawk, my darling girl.”_

_NO!_

Hana lashed out, shoving back at memories and emotions that were far too much for her three-year-old mind, at everything frightening and dangerous that refused to just _leave them alone_. The three men in their bright, glimmering metal skins went flying as far backwards as they could in the confines of Their Room, hitting the walls at awkward angles and with so much force that they crumpled to their knees. Only then did she recognise the intruder; Lancelot, her friend, the only person other than Gaius that her Daddy had always told her to trust. Someone who had come to help, not harm. Hana cried out, horrified. 

She hadn’t meant to, she hadn’t meant to, oh, oh, were the men okay?

Hana gasped with relief as Lancelot and the two other men stumbled upright, but the words that left his mouth shattered the Rules into pieces, and tore her world in two. _“She has magic.”_

“No. No,” Daddy pleaded. “It wasn’t her. Arthur, she’s three, she couldn’t possibly-”

“I saw, Merlin.”

“Arthur,” was all that her father could manage.

“You _knew_.” The words themselves trembled and shook. “That’s why you didn’t tell me.”

“Her mother was a Druid. I knew it was possible. Then, two years ago…” Two years. Two years ago she had been at the lake, and everything had been good in the world. She remembered, vaguely, how happy, how proud and full of love her mother had been the first time she’d used the magic, how she’d rushed and stumbled to tell Daddy the very next day when he had come to visit them. The two of them had laughed and embraced and smiled, and her father had twirled her through the air, and made her and mother a wreath of flowers both. Like magic was the greatest gift in the world. 

“You know the law,” the Man – Arthur, she recognised that name – was saying, and in his voice Hana could hear many things. Disbelief. Desperation. Anger, and hurt, and confusion.

Daddy flinched. “You would… you would drown her for her parents?” And she recognised something in his voice, too. Determination. Hana grabbed hold of one of his hands, trying to tell him that whatever he was about to do frightened her. She sensed rather than saw the orb of light that he coaxed into being above his free outstretched hand. “You’ll have to burn me too, sire.”

Burning was bad. All that she could think was _no. No,_ they would not take her Daddy, too. _No_ , she would not let them. Hana scowled, suddenly furious, trying to coax the magic into her shaking fingers. If they even tried she’d, she’d… she’d turn them all into _frogs_.

But she didn’t have to. “I – I can’t,” Arthur stuttered. The magic dissipated as Hana blinked, startled.

Daddy suddenly went still. “ _Please_ ,” he said again, more intently this time, and Hana dug up the courage to peak out around his back and watch the Man closely as his mouth opened and closed comically, and he carded his hand through his hair. She sensed the moment that something in him changed. It made him look smaller, softer, less threatening. 

“That’s not what I – What’s her name?” This time the words weren’t a demand. 

“Her – what?” Daddy stuttered.

“Her name _Mer_ lin, surely you gave her one.”

It wasn’t much in the way of a peace offering, but Hana was sure that her father could sense the change in the prat just as much as she could. “Hana,” he said carefully. “We named her Hana.”

“Can I see her?”

Above her Daddy hesitated, then nodded shakily, and she frowned as he turned his back on Arthur and the shiny men, kneeling down to look her in the eyes. The sudden lack of shouting was all well and good, in her mind, but she wasn’t sure that she wanted to move any closer to the three men in their brilliant red cloaks just yet. She pushed an image towards her father – men wearing the golden dragon crest shouting, screaming, waving their swords. _Are you sure, Daddy?_ She asked him warily, her bottom lip trembling.

“Shh, Hana,” he says gently. “Remember the prat – I mean, the prince? The prince I told you about?”

Of course she did. She bit her lip, and peeked back out at the man named Arthur, reconciling him with the king from Daddy’s stories; seeing in him both the man that her father had laughed about, and the one he had warned her about. The Prat and his knights were her father’s favourite subjects for his tales, though sometimes she found them confusing. He’d said that the prat was a good man. But he’d also said more than once that she was never to go near him. “You said I wasn’t supposed to talk to him. You said he was scary.”

“Hello, Hana. I promise I’ll try not to be scary,” Arthur said quietly, all of the anger gone out of his tone. She liked his voice better like this. It suited him.

“Daddy?” she said questioningly, not entirely sure what to do. Her father smiled.

“It’s alright. Right?”

She took a deep breath and nodded. Her father brushed a stray piece of hair fondly out of her eyes, placing a hand reassuringly on her shoulder before moving so that she could see the prat, and so that he could just barely see her too. Hana scrutinised him carefully, taking in his face, his armour, cataloguing it all away under _New_ and _Mine_. Her eyes flicked to dark-eyed man beside him, and to Lancelot’s tight smile for support. 

She frowned. Something had been annoying her about the prat since she’d first laid eyes on him, and now that she had permission her curiosity won over her fear. “Your hair’s shiny,” she said apologetically, wondering how it had ended up that way. “I’ve never seen shiny hair before.”

That pulled a smile out of the prat. “Those are Gwaine and Lancelot,” he said, gesturing behind him. Lancelot grinned, winking at her conspiratorially behind the other man’s back. “Lancelot’s nice, but you’re not allowed to spend time with Gwaine. He’ll corrupt you.”

“Hey!”

“Oh, it’s okay,” Hana said hurriedly. “I’m already co… co… thingie. The last time the guards came through, they said magic co… co… thingie. So I already am.”

All four men blinked and stared at her with wide eyes, and Hana shrank back a little, wondering what she’d said wrong. Her father turned and bundled her up in his arms, and with her face buried gratefully in his shoulder she barely heard the next words out of the shiny men’s mouths. But she did still hear them.

“Just so you know, I’m on her side,” the man who wasn’t Lancelot said quietly, and in the silence that followed she felt the world around them at a crossroads.

“I think that makes all of us, Gwaine,” Arthur said shakily in reply, and Hana gave a sigh of relief. They’d turned the right way, after all. 

**Author's Note:**

> About a year ago, I was reading a fic called "Merlin Headcanons" by one Drag0nst0rm, and enjoying it immensely. Seriously, folks, head to ff.net and track it down, or read the chapters that have been posted here. They're fabulous. That said, one in particular caught my attention, and hit a chord with me. So I fired of a comment to the author asking for permission to remix it, because I really wanted to further explore the idea. They kindly agreed. At the time I think the words 'I'll post it in a week or two' may have been used. 
> 
> Yeah. So. That didn't happen. Here I am a year later, slinking back with said remix. I really hope you all enjoyed it, drag0nst0rm especially.
> 
> I believe that their are quite a few people who have been waiting significant amounts of time for me to get off my backside and write up their requests, so this is the start of me doing that. My next update will be the final chapter of Enquiries, and from there I'll be free to dive into the fics you've all been waiting for so patiently. 
> 
> Thanks for reading, everyone! :)


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